Cheers Colin, you have supplied us with plenty to digest. I hope that the deck planking supplied with this build will have a decent grain to it. I have made a few mistakes with wood stains and finishing thereof before..I intend to not make those mistakes on the Victory, so some research is needed on the actual decking and materials needed to make it look as near as that when it was scoured with holystones? Please keep the much needed informative ideas coming mate, very intuitive in deed..

Nice one Colin, Personally I like to use the thread method, I have found in the past that markers can bleed, and the garphite from a pencil can get everywhere, as for tree nails, Good old cocktail sticks, usually do the trick!

I just wanna open a discussion here about the scale of the width of planks on the average kit or even these part-works, 5mm is pretty standard, but we have an opportunity here, after looking at the 100's of models on the net and with some having scale figures you have to wonder the scale of the planks do look oversized.

Plus, as mentioned in the previous post link regarding tree-nails, would you actually see them at that scale?

I do like the ideas of making the planks for the decks a little smaller, but with what the kit will offer it would mean cutting them down to at least half the size if I wanted to use only what is supplied, any bigger or shorter would mean I would not have enough.

To me half width planks at 2.5mm looks too small, or maybe not? I've considered the use of wood to give the effect I would like and Tanganyka Strip's offer's the best colour after staining, as seen on my Launch build, but I was looking at the 3mm strips available at Cornwall Model boats, this would mean no cutting strips down.

I'm just looking at options here, and would very much like you thoughts, the main problem here is again spending money on something that is expensive on its own but its an options and as said before an opportunity.

interesting topic there Colin got me thinking (time for a rant)

we are all paying good money for a 1/84 scale model which has been designed by experts etc so surely the bits we recieve are going to do the job scale wise (i hope)
or is the rest of the build going to follow as the launch ie replacing with thinner planks replacing duckboards etc as the more experienced modeller believes is more realistic (with which i agree)

I have been thinking of emulating the tar with pva glue waterd down with some black paint. what do poeple think? would it work?

Got to be worth a try either way Jase, ain't it?

ee oo dares wins